Genetic and linguistic differentiation in the Americas.

Ward, Ryk; Redd, Alan J.; Valencia, Diana; Frazier, Barbara L.; Pääbo, Svante

doi:10.1073/pnas.90.22.10663

Cited by 165 publications

(93 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…These exceptions appear to correspond to either rare cases of language replacement or genetic admixture between two linguistically distinct populations (Cavalli-Sforza 1997; Chu et al 1998) or cases in which the underlying classi¢cation of language variation remains uncertain (Ward et al 1993;Monsalve et al 1999). Thus, there appears to be a real di¡erence between humans and birds in the degree of coevolution of genetic and cultural traits.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For traditional human societies there is mounting evidence that language variation is often highly correlated with variation in neutral genes, suggesting that transmission of language has been primarily vertical (i.e. from parents to o¡spring) Piazza et al 1995;Cavalli-Sforza 1997) although some exceptions have been noted (Ward et al 1993;Chu et al 1998;Monsalve et al 1999). Conversely, studies of male song in oscine songbirds have generally not found a strong association between vocal and genetic variation (Kroodsma et al 1985;Fleischer & Rothstein 1988;Payne & Westneat 1988;Lougheed & Handford 1992;Catchpole & Slater 1995) suggesting that horizontal or oblique transmission (i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Population genetic structure and vocal dialects in an amazon parrot

Wright

Wilkinson

2001

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

132

101

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The relationship between cultural and genetic evolution was examined in the yellow-naped amazon Amazona auropalliata. This species has previously been shown to have regional dialects de¢ned by large shifts in the acoustic structure of its learned contact call. Mitochondrial DNA sequence variation from a 680 base pair segment of the ¢rst domain of the control region was assayed in 41 samples collected from two neighbouring dialects in Costa Rica. The relationship of genetic variation to vocal variation was examined using haplotype analysis, genetic distance analysis, a maximum-likelihood estimator of migration rates and phylogenetic reconstructions. All analyses indicated a high degree of gene £ow and, thus, individual dispersal across dialect boundaries. Calls sampled from sound libraries suggested that temporally stable contact call dialects occur throughout the range of the yellow-naped amazon, while the presence of similar dialects in the sister species Amazona ochrocephala suggests that the propensity to form dialects is ancestral in this clade. These results indicate that genes and culture are not closely associated in the yellow-naped amazon. Rather, they suggest that regional diversity in vocalizations is maintained by selective pressures that promote social learning and allow individual repertoires to conform to local call types.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Population genetic structure and vocal dialects in an amazon parrot

Wright

Wilkinson

2001

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

132

101

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“…Linguists agree that population fissions and range expansions play an important role in the generation of linguistic diversity (8)(9)(10). The correlation between patterns of linguistic and genetic variation has been studied by many researchers in different world regions with mixed positive (11)(12)(13)(14) and negative (15)(16)(17) findings. Regional differences in population history are likely to explain some of the discrepant results.…”

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confidence: 99%

Gene flow across linguistic boundaries in Native North American populations

Hunley

Long

2005

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

100

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Cultural and linguistic groups are often expected to represent genetic populations. In this article, we tested the hypothesis that the hierarchical classification of languages proposed by J. Greenberg [(1987) Language in the Americas (Stanford Univ. Press, Stanford, CA)] also represents the genetic structure of Native North American populations. The genetic data are mtDNA sequences for 17 populations gleaned from literature sources and public databases. The hypothesis was rejected. Further analysis showed that departure of the genetic structure from the linguistic classification was pervasive and not due to an outlier population or a problematic language group. Therefore, Greenberg's language groups are at best an imperfect approximation to the genetic structure of these populations. Moreover, we show that the genetic structure among these Native North American populations departs significantly from the best-fitting hierarchical models. Analysis of median joining networks for mtDNA haplotypes provides strong evidence for gene flow across linguistic boundaries. In principle, the language of a population can be replaced more rapidly than its genes because language can be transmitted both vertically from parents to children and horizontally between unrelated people. However, languages are part of a cultural complex, and there may be strong pressure to maintain a language in place whereas genes are free to flow.language and genetics ͉ mtDNA

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“…This difficult situation calls for an efficient phylogenetic analysis to enhance the usefulness of ancient DNA data. Recently a large number of nucleotide sequences, especially for the hypervariable region I of the control region, have been deposited in the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank International Nucleotide Sequence Database (e.g., Vig ilantet al, 1991;Di Rienzo and Wilson 1991;Ward et al, 1991Ward et al, , 1993Shields et al, 1993;Batista et al, 1995;Redd et al, 1995;Sykes et al, 1995;Betty et al, 1995;Kolman et al, 1996;Comas et al, 1996;Horai et al, 1996). In this study, we re trievedthese human mtDNA nucleotide sequences from the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank database, in order to examine precision of the phylogenetic analyses using the mtD NAshort sequence.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%